The Regional Commissioner of Income Tax (RCIT), Southern Region, is to set up tax facilitation centres (TFC) at various trade associations to help businessmen file their tax returns. This was stated by Additional Commissioner of Income Tax Mohammad Ali, while addressing members of the Federal "B" Area Association of Trade and Industry (FBTTI) on Thursday. He said that the income tax officers, to be deputed at the associations, would also help new taxpayers to obtain National Tax Number (NTN), which was essential for every business transaction.
He said that the TFC would provide new return forms and the NTN application forms to the interested members of the association and help them in filling forms to get the NTN certificates at their premises.
Mohammad Ali said that the new Income Tax Ordinance had introduced a harassment-free environment for the taxpayers, which allowed them to make their own tax assessment and deposit the same.
The returns, filed by the taxpayers were now accepted by the department under the Universal Self-Assessment Scheme (USAC), he added.
He said that earlier the notices were issued to the people not filing income tax returns and penalty was imposed on them. But the department had stopped issuing notices to the taxpayers not filing tax returns, he said.
He exhorted the association members, who failed to file tax returns by the September 30 deadline last year, to file their tax returns now, which would be accepted without any question or penalty.
The Additional Commissioner of Income Tax informed the FBTTI members that under the new law, the taxpayers, despite a mistake up to five years, had been allowed to revise their tax returns without paying any penalty.
Earlier in his welcome address, FBTTI Chairman Rehan Zeeshan said that the cases of association members, who paid 20 percent additional tax to get exemption from audit, had not yet been finalised.
Their files were still lying buried in shelves and in some cases, the files had been disappeared, he said.
The Income Tax official asked the association to provide list of such members so that their cases could be closed. But, he said, there were also some members who had not revised their tax liability, and added the department would provide list of such cases to the association.
Speaking at the luncheon meeting, Assistant Director General of Employees Old-Age Benefits Institution (EOBI) Javed Iqbal said that a new tax culture was in place for the last two years to facilitate the factory owners.
A dispute resolution committee had been set up at the FBTTI and both the parties would accept its verdict, he added.
He said that the draft of a universal self-assessment scheme was under consideration at the Ministry of Labour and would be introduced after it was approved by the Parliament
Presently there were two schemes in vogue for the payment of EOBI dues, which provided payment of Rs 150 per employee or five percent of the employee's wages, which should not be less than the minimum wage fixed by the government.
The meeting was attended, among others, by senior members of the association, including Javed Sultan Japanwala, Masood Alam and Syed Muzammil Husain.
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